


i just left you a three minute long voicemail of me singing. sorry.

by orphan_account



Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Neighbors, Caretaking, Comfort, Cute, Drunk Texting, Future date, Humor, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Minor Angst, Neighbors, Shane is sweet, Soft Shane Madej, Strangers to Friends, Texting, drunk ryan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-25
Updated: 2018-07-25
Packaged: 2019-06-16 08:16:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,995
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15432819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: for a month, shane's been getting weird texts from an unknown number that make no sense. then the number calls him.or, the one where shane's in love with a textbot that isn't a textbot.





	i just left you a three minute long voicemail of me singing. sorry.

**Author's Note:**

> most of the weird texts i use in this come from this list of text au prompts: http://memesandthings.tumblr.com/post/150074519132/text-message-starters-send-one-of-the-prompts

_( ✉ → sms ) received 3:12 am: i think my neighbor is an alien._

_( ✉ → sms ) received 7:30 am: help me think of a name for a new dog_

_( ✉ → sms ) received 2:02 pm: should i get pizza or chicken wings for dinner?_

_( ✉ → sms ) received 6:17 pm: no one’s ever made me feel the way you do._

Shane stared at his phone, scrolling up through the messages with an eyebrow raised. This was the end of the first month of what felt like non-stop texts from an unknown number that he could never locate. He would be dead in the ground before he cracked open a phonebook just to find out that some textbot was trolling him, so he'd never respond. And he never told his friends that this was happening, although it might be a source for an inside joke. He didn't want to entertain the texts, and for a long time, he didn't.

After the first few days, he'd started trying to decipher things. He put all the times into a code analysis program during his lunch hour, but came up with nothing. He looked for common phrases, looking up common text patterns and writing down each pause between the messages. Still nothing. So, after a week of analysis and stress and hacker shit, Shane just leaned back and enjoyed for the ride.

And then the next month came, and Shane began to wonder if maybe he'd misinterpreted things.

His phone rang once, twice, three times at 3 am, waking him up. He propped himself up on his elbow, pushing his glasses onto his face with lazy fingers, peering to the screen of his phone. It was the unknown number, the same 02 number that he had been glancing at during his free time. I didn't know textbots could call, he thought to himself, considering picking up. But then the ringing stopped, and Shane realized how early it was, so he tossed his glasses back onto the nightstand and buried his face in his pillow.

When he woke up, he had a few text notifications that made his heart hurt. Just a little bit, as his heart was deeply cynical and completely protected by layers of emotion-proof brick.

_( ✉ → sms ) received 4:45 am: stop being so fuckigjn borign and coekm to my party_

_( ✉ → sms ) received 4:45 am: i dropped my pzziza o nt eh floror im fuckgin pissed_

_( ✉ → sms ) received 4:45 am: i j sut left you a 3 mintue long voicemail singing. sorry_

Shane listened to the entire voicemail, just to make sure that it wasn't a bot. And it wasn't. It was a real person's voice, slurred and tired and solemn, singing the happy birthday song with a short interlude of a hardly-understandable apology, and an excerpt of a Celine Dion song. That absolutely broke him, though. He didn't cry, but he called in sick from work and listened to it for hours.

Whoever this guy was, he was a truly tragic person. Loud, drunk, tragic little man. Shane was imagining him as a small little guy. Seemed about right.

Shane finally left his house around noon when he received no messages. He figured the guy needed a break from being awake, so Shane could do something with his time without having to stop and read whatever development arises.

When he stepped into the hallway and went to lock his door, he saw another man stumble outside of his own apartment, barefoot and shirtless with a dark spiky mop of bedhead. He looked as if he'd been sleeping for years and didn't know what day it was.

"Hey, man," Shane said with a soft smile, "You good?"

"Nah, I don't wanna buy anything, thanks," he muttered with a vaguely familiar voice, rubbing his eyes. "What time is it?"

"About noon," Shane replied, locking his apartment up. "Take care of yourself, buddy."

The man just groaned in response, picking up a box by his feet and receding back into the darkness of his apartment.

Shane thought about the man for another hour as he drove to the store, tapping his hands on the steering wheel and looking to his phone every time he hit a stoplight. Still nothing from his accidental not-so-textbot friend. If he could call them friends. He might have wanted to.

Shane grabbed a tub - yes, a tub - of ice cream as well as the usual groceries (actual, adult foods that held actual nutrition value), making a silent promise that if the textbot (he really needed to learn his name) messaged again, he'd respond.

He wasn't disappointed.

After dozing a bit on the couch, Shane woke up to the ping of his phone. He'd missed a few messages, but he hurriedly ran to the kitchen to fetch his Tub of Comfort while reading.

_( ✉ → sms ) received 3:32 am: i fukcing miss yo u_

_( ✉ → sms ) received 4:00 am: i look so fuckigjn GOOD_

( ✉ ← sms ) sent 4:01 am: i'm sure you do, buddy.

_( ✉ → sms ) received 4:03 am: oh_

_( ✉ → sms ) received 4:03 am: hi_

( ✉ ← sms ) sent 4:03 am: hello. are you okay?

_( ✉ → sms ) received 4:04 am: plea se eh elep me im drunk and i dotn know whe re i am_

Shane placed his Tub in the kitchen sink and frowned at his phone.

( ✉ ← sms ) sent 4:05 am: i'm here, man. where are you?

_( ✉ → sms ) received 4:05 am: i csnst stop throwiging up_

( ✉ ← sms ) sent 4:07 am: take deep breaths and try to get some water into your body

Shane couldn't help but feel creepy when he actually typed out a question asking where this drunk stranger lived. It felt a bit off, maybe he was crossing a line, but this guy he was texting was troubled. And he asked for help, so. Shane was going to deliver.

_( ✉ → sms ) received 4:09 am: scsry appartment bujlding_

_( ✉ → sms ) received 4:10 am: room 204_

Shane paused. He walked to his door and peered through the peephole to the door across from him. 204.

( ✉ ← sms ) sent 4:13 am: can i come over? is that okay?

_( ✉ → sms ) received 4:15 am: yes yes yes yes yse yse ysey seys ey sey seye sey ey esy yes yesy_

_( ✉ → sms ) received 4:15 am: pelase_

Shane dropped everything. Almost his phone, as well, but he figured he needed it. He wanted to run across the hall and bang the heels of his palms against the door and ask what was happening, ask why this was happening to him and to this guy, but he didn't. He grabbed a cold bottle of water and a bottle of ibuprofen and walked coolly across the hall, rapping gently against the white-painted wood.

The spiky hair guy. The whole time. The tiny muscular man across the hall was his textbot for an entire month. Shane wondered if he could ask the man why he texted Shane, but when the door opened and the man fell out and into Shane's arms, Shane figured it wasn't a great time.

"Woah, okay, bud. I gotcha," Shane said, tossing the water and the pills blindly into the apartment. "Are ya conscious? Can you tell me your name?

"Ryan," came the groan into his neck.

"Alright, Ryan. Let's get you all settled," Shane felt along the wall for a light switch, flipping it on to the chagrin of Ryan, who made an indignant noise against the brightness. "I'm gonna sit you down on the couch, now. Okay?"

"Mmph," Ryan replied groggily as his body was slumped (as gently as possible) onto the beige fabric.

"It's okay. You're safe."

"Not alone," Ryan corrected him, his voice practically falling from his lips without consulting the rest of the body.

"Right. You're not alone 'cause I'm here. 'Kay? All safe," Shane was just muttering at this point. He'd been slammed before. It doesn't really matter what you're saying, as long as it's generally positive, and a drunk person will be comforted. "Alllll safe, bud. I'm gonna grab a water bottle, okay?"

Ryan hummed, his head lulling back and forward, back and forward. His neck gave little to no support of his head.

Shane returned, placing one hand behind Ryan's head, the other carefully pouring water into his mouth.

The rest of everything was quick. Shane carried Ryan into Ryan's room, asking him if it was okay for Shane to lay him on the bed (he felt that he was intruding more than he should, but he desperately wanted to help the guy), asking if it was okay to drape the blankets over him. Shane could have blinked slower than it happened.

Then Shane woke up on a strange, beige couch in an unfamiliar place, his neighbor standing across the room and staring hazily at him. Shane scrambled to a sitting position, his long legs folding in on themselves.

"Hi," Shane decided to say.

"Hello," Ryan replied, his voice gruff. "How did you get in?"

"You let me in."

"Huh," Ryan said, nodding, before disappearing into the bathroom. Shane sat up straighter, confused, watching after him as the shower turned on. Immediately it turned off, and Ryan was running back into the living room. "Wait, hold on. What the fuck?"

"I'm your neighbor. Across the hall," Shane starts to explain, but ends up just shaking his head. "You, uh... texted me."

"My address?"

"Yes. But also, before that." Shane pulled up their texts, scrolling up to the first one Ryan had sent about a month earlier.

Ryan took Shane's phone and squinted at it. His head must have been killing him, but he had to deal with this new person in his place first.

"Oh."

"Can you maybe... not right now, if you're not feeling up to it, but eventually explain why you texted?" Shane asked carefully, softly. "Not that it was a bother or anything. It was fine. I'm just curious. And worried."

"For me?" Ryan asked, not looking at him.

"Yes. For you," Shane replied. His phone was returned to his hands.

"You have my old number," Ryan said, wincing and pressing his fingers to his eyes. "I was just texting my old number things that I was thinking. I didn't think anyone was getting them. Sorry."

"It's no problem." Shane went to stand, but stopped and looked at Ryan, "Wait, so you thought your old number was never gonna get used again?"

"Shut up..." Ryan opened an eye to look at the tall man on his couch.

"My name's Shane."

"Cool. Shut up, Shane."

"Will do," Shane stood and bowed, "Nice meetin' ya. If you need anything, you know where to find me. And my... number."

Ryan nodded. "I do."

Shane walked to the door, reaching for the handle. He spun around, "Wait, am I the neighbor you thought was an alien?"

Ryan blushed and looked away. "You're too tall to be human."

Shane shook his head and laughed. "I can't believe... and the dog?"

"I wasn't getting one. Just saw a dog and was guessing its name," Ryan laughed, his voice warming up.

"And the pizza you dropped?"

"I cried for awhile," Ryan admitted.

"I would have."

Ryan shook his head, "Are you still leaving?"

"I was, but I'm kind of interested in you."

Ryan rolled his eyes. "Kind of?"

"I don't want to speak in absolutes because you kind of speculated that I was an alien, to me."

Ryan pushed him out and locked the door. Shane laughed.

"Do you wanna go on a date, then?" Shane asked through the door, half joking.

"Maybe." Came the muffled response. "Where are we gonna go?"

"We can get pizza. Sober. So you don't drop it."

There was a pause. "Call me later."

Shane returned to his own apartment with a wide grin on his face.

_( ✉ → sms ) received 10:21 am: also! thank you for everything, shane. forgot about that part._

Shane's mood couldn't be bothered. Even by the tub of melted ice cream in his sink.


End file.
